


Could Have Been

by Stayawhile



Category: Eureka
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-28
Updated: 2011-03-28
Packaged: 2017-10-17 08:27:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/174866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stayawhile/pseuds/Stayawhile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Episode tag to 4.08, "The Ex-Files."  Spoilers for, well, everything up to that point.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Could Have Been

“You have got to be kidding me.”

Jack stared, aghast, at his bed. Bad enough that Allison couldn’t be there with him, but this…

“Why the hell are you still here? I thought I resolved everything with Allison, and you disappeared, and by the way, don’t they have shirts in whatever afterlife you come from?”

Nathan Stark stretched, the movement showing his muscular shoulders and arms to advantage. “Not the afterlife, Carter, just your itsy-bitsy brain. We went over this, remember?” He smirked, patting the unnocupied side of the bed. “You tell me why I’m shirtless.”

Jack looked away, hoping desperately that Stark was wearing something under the sheets. “This is so not good,” he muttered. He glanced back at his bed, and the smirk was gone, replaced by a serious expression he couldn’t quite read. “Look, let’s just get this over with. I want you gone for good.”

“Hey, that’s all up to you,” Nathan replied cheerfully. “Sit down, Carter. I don’t bite.” As Jack perched on the edge of the bed he added, “Well, not unless I’m asked.” They sat silently for a moment, Jack facing away from his imaginary nemesis. Nathan sighed.

“I can see I’m going to have to do all the work here,” he said. “Clearly, you’ve been thinking about my body. Now why would that be?” Jack shook his head and mumbled something. “What was that? Did you say Allison?”

“Yes, Allison,” Jack said out loud. “We’re finally together, after all that, and you’re still…”

“Better looking than you? Hotter? Better built?” Nathan asked with a grin. “I mean, smarter is a given, but I really do surpass you in so many ways.”

Jack glared. “When it comes to being an arrogant jackass, yeah, you do.” He paused, then spoke more softly. “So I should benefit by comparison.”

“Ah, so that’s it! Worried you won’t measure up, so to speak?”

Jack couldn’t help glancing at the bedsheets…and the tent that had appeared there. He groaned, shifting his gaze quickly to Nathan’s face. “Not like that! For godsake, put that away!” He paused for a moment, then sighed. “All right. Yeah. I mean, she can’t help comparing, right? Mr. Nobel-prize-winning abs of doom. Tall, dark and handsome, plus brilliant. No wonder she chose you.”

“She chose me because you let her,” Nathan said softly. “Deep down, you didn’t think you could compete, so you stopped trying.” He paused. “That surprised me.”

“No! I just wanted her to be happy!” Jack protested. Nathan kept watching him, an appraising look on his face.

“Then we both wanted the same thing,” he said. “Thing is, I can’t make her happy anymore. I’m gone, dead, disappeared, out of the picture. Nothing but a memory.”

Jack stood up and began pacing. SARAH was oddly silent, he thought. Usually she had a comment on everything. Well, maybe if this was all happening inside his head, her sensors couldn’t pick it up. “Yeah, the thing about that. People always remember the good stuff. Speak no ill of the dead, yadda yadda. The longer you’re gone, the more she’ll forget how much of a jerk you can be. And there I’ll be—”

“Clueless Carter,” Stark interrupted. “Just an average, ordinary guy, always one step behind everybody else around here. Right?” Jack turned to face him. “Even now, you’re afraid you can’t compete.”

“At least she chose me over Grant,” Jack said defensively. “I’m starting to hate that guy just as much as I hated you.”

Stark shook his head. “You never hated me.” He held up a hand just as Jack began to speak and added, “Just like I never hated you.”

Now Jack was shaking his head. “No. Well…I hated you at first. But by the time you…died…and I gotta say, it is really freaking weird having a conversation with a dead guy, by the way…” He sank down on the bed. “We could have been friends. Maybe.”

“Or more,” Nathan said lightly. Jack snorted derisively. “Oh, come on, Carter. There were moments when you didn’t know which of us you wanted, me or Allison. You’re pretty damn good at repressing, but I’m in your head, so it’s kind of hard to hide. You might as well just deal with it.”

Jack’s hands twisted in his lap, his right hand moving to twist the wedding ring he’d taken off three years ago, an old habit he’d never completely lost. He laughed briefly. “Yeah,” he said to the opposite wall. “We’ve already established that you’re hot. And I’ve never exactly been a Kinsey zero.”

“And we had fun arguing with each other. All the putdowns, the attitude, the sarcasm…it was always entertaining, wasn’t it?” Nathan reached out a hand and put it on Jack’s shoulder. Jack didn’t flinch.

“We did. I miss it.” He paused, feeling the warmth of a touch that wasn’t really there, the relief of saying things out loud at last. “Besides, we had something in common from the start. We were in love with the same woman.”

“It’s a kind of bond,” Nathan responded thoughtfully.

The room was warm, Jack thought. He’d have to get SARAH to run a diagnostic on her environmental systems.

“I wanted you too,” Nathan said quietly. “You’re an attractive man, Jack. You’ve got a lot going for you. Allison’s not the only one who can see it.”

Jack smiled wryly, and at last turned to look at Nathan, whose hand slipped down his arm, coming to rest on his thigh. “Yeah, you say that now, when you’re dead and really just part of my subconscious.”

“Accept it, Jack. There were moments—you know the ones I’m talking about, you’ve thought about them often enough. They were real. If things had been different…”

“If,” Jack said, feeling the weight and warmth of Nathan’s hand on his leg, looking at the other man’s intent green eyes, his half smile. “I’ve never been big on what-if. Deal with what’s in front of you, that’s my motto.”

“I’m in front of you right now,” Nathan said. Then he leaned in to place his lips on Jack’s. What the hell, Jack thought. It doesn’t count, it isn’t real. And he kissed back.

It certainly felt real, though. Soft and warm and wet, and Jack felt himself hardening as the kiss went on and on. It didn’t matter if it was a fantasy or a dream or a break with reality, he decided. It was happening, and he might as well enjoy it, and so he turned into Nathan’s embrace, reaching up one hand to stroke the other man’s soft, dark curls.

 

 

He woke up alone, of course, and lay quietly, staring at the ceiling. He was pretty sure he wouldn’t be seeing Nathan Stark again, unless the SOB really did find a way to come back from the dead. Living in Eureka had taught him never to rule out anything, no matter how improbable, but he’d deal with that when it was in front of him, and not before.

Nathan Stark was gone, but not forgotten, and he could live with his regrets. Allison was his present, and his future.

“It is time to get up, Jack,” SARAH said.

“Thanks, SARAH,” he replied absently. “Here goes another day in Eureka.”

**Author's Note:**

> Previously posted at the Eureka_tag LJ community.


End file.
